Cigarette Smoke
by Tuppence
Summary: Emmett ponders on Rosalie and the different impressions he has had of her, in his time. A series of non-chronological one-shots focussing on Emmett. A slightly dark look at what Emmett might think of Rosalie. Rated T to be on the safe side. Please R
1. Sweet Scent of Cigarettes

**erDisclaimer****:** I don't own Twilight and its sequels.

**Author's notes****:** Ok, so I'm feeling the Twilight love at the moment, and a few moments of inspiration led to the completion of this one. I hope you guys like it – it started off with a vague idea of just wondering what if Emmett didn't see Rosalie as a perfect little angel or princess or nymph or something. And of course, my love of Cowboy Bebop came in handy, bringing an idea of Rosalie and cigarettes and the wrong kind of angel. And I wondered what if Emmett really knew this and accepted it nevertheless? (I have to admit, though, that blonde Julia in Cowboy Bebop appeals to me not. I love my raven-haired Faye. But this does not detract from my love of Rosalie.) So anyway, this is again a series of non-chronological one-shots, this time focussing on Emmett and Rosalie, and more with Emmett's point of view really. It's aiming for a slightly darker feel, less optimistic and rose tinted because, let's be honest, there's no way that anyone, vampire or not, can remain unscathed by a rape. So yes, here it is; my love of Cowboy Bebop producing a cigarette-smoke-drenched Rosalie and an Emmett who doesn't think of her as an angel or a goddess. I really hope you guys like it.

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Sweet Scent of Cigarettes

The first time he had seen her, on the brink of dying, he had thought of her as an angel. Beautiful golden hair – golden, not blonde, certainly nothing common like blonde – with her perfectly chiselled features, her large eyes and gorgeous skin that seemed to glitter. He had accepted death if someone that beautiful would come for him.

After he had been transformed, she had seemed altered. More beautiful than before, her previously flawlessly pure white skin had tones and tints that he had never seen before, shades of colours that didn't exist in human eyes. Her eyes seemed more perplexing and her hair seemed to be evidence that there were different hues of golden, as pure and as dazzling as each other but so different. She hadn't seemed like an angel then. She seemed more like a goddess, simultaneously more human and more inhuman than the angel he had previously thought of her as. No Greek could have written about Aphrodite if they hadn't seen her and no Roman could have painted a Venus that could compare to her. She was enticing with her beauty, intoxicating with all the potential raw love that radiated from her. He could have been drunk on her very self, every little blink seemed like a glass of vodka drunk.

And then he had heard her talk to a boy standing next to her – he seemed like nothing but a sulky boy to him, pouting and scowling as he stood next to something so entrancing. He had seen her lips move oh so perfectly, and they had ended in a smile, the ends of her lips twisted up. She hadn't been like an angel then, unearthly and surreal, heralding death; nor had she been a goddess blindingly beautiful in inhuman ways, exhilarating in the very human love that seemed to lie latent in her. She had been something else - something that seemed cruel and vicious, animalistic and evil, something very dark and twisted. He saw her lips in something resembling a smile but instead of lips curling upwards, they seemed to twist instead. He saw her in a new light then. He realised, almost instinctively, that she wasn't a happy person. Almost just as instinctively, he realised that the bitterness enveloping her meant that she _had_ been a happy person once. He wondered what had happened.

The next time he had seen her was after he had killed a few animals and quenched the thirst. His first hunt had been relatively clumsy, blood spilling and dropping over his clothes and, as she had caught sight of it (or maybe just smelt it) she had wrinkled her nose in disgust and looked away. He'd wondered who she was really angry at, because he hadn't done anything and neither had Edward (that he was aware of, although his seemingly perpetual scowl was off-putting). That was the first time that he had caught a glimpse of her anger, the anger that was fairly infamous in the Cullen household, the same anger that was overhyped, overrated and under-present. He'd wondered why the others couldn't see through her fake anger. It was years later before he realised that it wasn't that they couldn't, it was that they wouldn't. They wouldn't deny Rosalie her right to feign her anger and they couldn't put her through the unnecessary doubt and pain that she'd go through. He loved and respected his family all the more for allowing the facade to continue.

It had been days after his first hunt that he saw her actually lose her temper. In those days, she had arduously ignored his own presence, never glancing at him, let alone speaking to him. And in those days, he had developed what he had considered to be a very unhealthy obsession. Now, he didn't consider it to be an unhealthy obsession, he _knew_ it to be one. But that unhealthy obsession had led him to observe her carefully, ignoring Edward's taunts and Esme's knowing smiles. He learned the different expressions that her face took on without realising, the smiles that were never smiles and the frowns that were never frowns. But on that day, when he first saw her really lose her temper, he saw her rebellion. He saw the way she seethed in almost literal terms. He saw her stubborn chin jut forward more than usual. He saw the way her full lips straightened out into as thin a line as such full lips could. He saw eyes sparkling with anger, tiny fists clenched in rage, and he saw her proud head tilt backwards, staring furiously at Edward. She was a Statue of Rage, but he didn't see the anger in her, he saw rebellion. He saw a girl trying to fight back against whatever seemed wrong to her; it seemed to him that Edward was the personification of everything that was wrong to her.

And a few weeks after that, he had finally summoned up the courage to talk to her. She had raised her eyebrows in mocking surprise but her voice had held no mockery surprisingly. She'd replied to him, pleasantly enough, although he was hyperaware of every little nuance and more than ready to find an affront where there was none. And the image that he had held of her after than first conversation was one that remained strong in his mind to this day. He'd seen her then, not visually but odorously. He didn't see her as an angel or a goddess, as a mythical figure or as a very human idea. He'd instead seen her as cigarette smoke, smelt her like cigarette smoke. She even seemed to feel like it, wrong but so seductive, cancerous but comforting at the same time. Just like cigarette smoke, it radiated from her and he had wondered how he could have missed it for so long when he could almost smell it, when he could almost breathe it in.

And then she'd smiled at him. It hadn't been the twist that had reminded him of bile and unspeakable cruelty. It was a genuine smile, a sign of pleasure and happiness. And though that smile had made him feel lightheaded, though it had irrevocably altered his life and destiny and everything pertaining to it, the cigarette smoke had been omnipresent. He had seen the smile as if through a haze of cigarette smoke and it had felt much like a mirage to him, the kind that showed death in the most frightening of lights, and yet the most appealing. And he had been hooked ever since, worse than bloodlust or drugs, the addiction was unhealthy at best, toxic in the minimum. At worst...but he didn't dare to think what the worst could mean. All he knew was that whenever he saw Rosalie, he saw her being through a diaphanous sheath of cigarette smoke as he felt the sick craving beginning to stir. And even when he didn't see her, he smelt that sweet toxic pungent scent of cigarettes lingering, tempting him, taunting him, killing him softly and surely and he bowed to it each time, without the least resistance.

After all, if Rosalie could be described by anything, she could be described by cigarette smoke, he had decided in the end.


	2. Nape of her Neck

**Disclaimer****:** Don't own Twilight.

**Author's Note****:** So I find it really hard to write for this pairing, because there's so little substance to them in the books. But I really like this...sort of...image of sadomasochistic relationship between the two of them, because I can imagine that if Rosalie ever really let go of all that control society had instilled into her, she would be absolutely terrifying. And I can imagine Emmett, big, muscular, powerful Emmett to revel anything that could possibly rival his own power in a different way. So out of these considerations, this one-off was born. Also because I do think the nape is rather sexy, so here you have it. Next time, there might even be a proper conversation between the two of them.

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Nape of her Neck

He could see the nape of her neck, he thought dazedly. And what a stupid thought that was too. If he hadn't been so dazed, he would have told himself to stop staring, stop making a fool of himself and to stop being such a pervert. But it was the first time Rosalie had done her hair in a bun and all he could do is stare at the nape of her neck, like it was the most beautiful, enticing thing he had ever seen.

Even if it was the most beautiful, enticing thing he had ever seen.

He was just lucky that he was the first one down, aside from Rosalie of course. With her back to him, he could stare at her all he pleased and she would be none the wiser. It wasn't so much that he didn't want to hear her barbed comments or see the mockery in her face. He'd fast become accustomed to it. It bothered him a lot more that she would turn around and he would lose sight of the nape of her neck.

It was true that he had seen very few women, unrelated to him in his time, but it couldn't be just sexual repression that had him this..._fascinated_ with Rosalie, could it? After all, he had never considered Esme in that light, though that could be explained by her matronly behaviour. But Rosalie, he thought, still eyeing those golden curls at the tip of her neck, Rosalie was something else entirely. He would find himself thinking about her all the time. When she was around, his vision would get fixated on her, around her, of her. And her smell was almost literally dizzying.

She was a distraction from _life_, which surely couldn't be normal or healthy? It was just luck that he didn't need to breathe otherwise he was bound to have died a while back. He couldn't hunt properly when she was around to the extent that Edward ran interference and made sure that when he had to hunt, Rosalie wasn't around. And he stuttered like a moron when he was with her, often losing track of the conversation.

It was definitely not _normal_; Edward's knowing glances and condescending smirks left him in no doubt of that. But he didn't understand what differentiated him from Edward. He'd seen Edward watch Rosalie closely when he thought nobody else was (only because Edward was in Emmett's line of vision of Rosalie). He'd seen many instances of purposely irking Rosalie, of losing track of the conversation too, when certain words, triggers, would give Rosalie this blank, distant look in her eyes and Edward would fist his hands, his lips tight in a thin, vicious line. But why did _these_ instances differ from his with Rosalie?

Instinctively, without having been told so, he knew that they did differ.

He hadn't realised but he'd moved closer to Rosalie, to her delicately shaped back of neck - _and what a delicate piece of art it was_ – until he heard her murmur a faint "hello". And without a backward glance too, but Emmett wasn't complaining. He was still staring at the bare flesh normally covered by her hair and now, he was close enough to see slight movements as she breathed in and out.

She craned her neck when she heard no reply, and the movement created such fascinated wrinkles and folds in her skin, adding shades and shadows that he could've stared at for hours. Literally. He looked away long enough to see a wry twist to her lips, as she murmured a "distracted again?" before turning away from him again.

She was so damn..._Rosalie_. There was no other word to describe her. He wanted to touch her neck, feel the skin beneath his fingers, but he was almost certain that was a bad idea. The few times he had come in close contact with Rosalie, she had carefully shied away from any actual physical contact. It made her that much more alluring, if he ever chose to think about it. But _now_, being alone with her, seeing her bare nape for the first time, it had become mesmerising in the worst possible way.

Casually, so _damn_ casually, Rosalie lifted her fingers, patted her hair down, brushed the loose bun it was in and trailed down her neck. And _god_ was it tantalising; so much so that Emmett had to swallow some of the venom that had pooled in his mouth.

He stepped closer, ever closer, to this _monster_ of beauty before him. He could see faint shadows, the outlines of sinew, the contours of muscles and didn't it look fragile? He could it all moving as she took a breath in, held it longer than an ordinary human should've, and let it out. She was having that dizzying effect on him again and he wanted to just snap himself out of it, if only he knew how. Maybe he could pull that hair of hers down, cover up what had him so absorbed. Or he could just break it, crush it between his fingers; it was so slim, thin, _weak_, _fragile_, so easy to destroy.

He heard-felt-smelt Edward less than a second later. He kept forgetting the vampire could hear his thoughts and although he knew that he would never hurt a hair on Rosalie's head, Edward had no such expectations from him. The defensive stance he took between him and Rosalie and the furious glint in Edward's eyes illustrated this clearly.

And all he could focus on was how Rosalie had turned around when Edward came, that suspicious look across her face and that wary look in her eyes. Any thought of fragility and vulnerability went out of his mind. A woman that looked like that, whose lips twisted instead of smiled, that held such intensity and focus, such a woman could never be anything but a force to be reckoned with.

It was _that_ that he wanted to see, to taste and feel and surround himself by. He wanted to pull her hair and crush her neck and shake her until she let go of that cold facade and unleashed the destruction within her. Beauty and power such as hers was not created to be admired or worshipped. It was created for chaos and devastation and what he wouldn't do to be the focus of that annihilation.

And when she turned her back on him again, when Edward clearly deemed him threat-free and moved to stand next to Rosalie, both of them tinkling on the piano, Emmett was free to go back to staring at the slender neck, imagining what it would look like when Rosalie let go, let free the wanton devastation she was capable of. He was waiting for that day and until then, he would watch and observe and memorise and stay mesmerised by this compelling addiction he found himself with.


End file.
